Hermsprong

Hermsprong: or, Man As He is Not is a 1796 philosophical novel by Robert Bage. It is the main work for which Bage is remembered and was his last novel. He had previously published a novel entitled Man As He Is.

Hermsprong
First edition title page.
AuthorRobert Bage
LanguageEnglish
Publication date
1796
Media typePrint

The novel was regarded as radical at the time it was published. It was shaped by the revolutionary ideas of its period and expresses some feminist views through two of its characters, the eponymous hero and Maria Fluart.[1] The views voiced by Fluart were applauded by Mary Wollstonecraft.[2]

The novel has a somewhat disjointed structure. The first half has strong philosophical content, but in the second half the book becomes a sentimental novel.

The philosophical challenge of the novel is that it concerns an American who has been raised entirely by American Indians, without either formal education or religion. With only nature to teach him, he sees through the hypocrisy of English society and manners. The novel is notable for pursuing the theme of the noble savage and, in particular, nativism. Throughout the novel Bage repeatedly uses the terms "pride" and "prejudice" in senses similar to those explored by Jane Austen in Pride and Prejudice.

Editions
  • 1796.[3]
  • 1799, corrected.
  • 1828, Chiswick Press.
  • 1951, London: Turnstile Press, ed. Vaughan Wilkins.
  • 1971, Garland Press, facsimile of 1796 edition.
  • 1982, Pennsylvania State University Press, ed. Stuart Tave.
  • 1985, Oxford: The World's Classics, Oxford University Press, ed. Peter Faulkner.

Bibliography
  • Title Hermsprong: or, Man as He is Not, a novel in two volumes by the author of Man as He Is
  • Author Robert Bage
  • Printer and publishers printed by Brett Smith, for P. Wogan, P. Byrne, J. Moore, and J. Rice, 1796

Footnotes
  1. Ty 1993, p.12.
  2. Knox-Shaw 2004, p.100.
  3. Faulkner edition, 1985, pp. xxi, xxiii.
gollark: I release all the stuff I'm not utterly ashamed of under permissive licensing because it is never going to be used for cashmoney™ ever.
gollark: Some offense, but yes, what γibson said.
gollark: I don't care a massive amount either way.
gollark: Yeß. And there's a TCP←→websocket proxy around anyway.
gollark: I, for one, mirror everything ever out of spite.

References
  • Peter Knox-Shaw, Jane Austen and the Enlightenment, Cambridge University Press, 2004, ISBN 978-0-521-84346-1
  • Eleanor Ty, Unsex'd Revolutionaries, University of Toronto Press, 1993, ISBN 978-0-8020-7774-5


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